Death Trap
by The two stars
Summary: What would it be like to be completely helpless... in the hands of a psychopath? How far would you go to save your friends? Or yourself? Let the games begin
1. Chapter 1

A/N

All right, my darlings, so this is another story that I decided to write. This one is going to be somewhat… darker, so if you don't like that kind of thing then check out my humour/romance story "The Naruto Truth or Dare". Anyway sit back, relax, grab a coke, and enjoy!

Disclaimer: Naruto is the property of that fine upstanding gentleman Masashi Kishimoto and TV Tokyo; I claim no right to the following characters.

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It was just a phone-call, nothing more. Just an innocent little phone-call that started the whole thing. It was scary how something so small could be so nightmarish.

_*Ring ring*_

_*Ring ring*_

SMASH!

There is no sound quite so terrible as the shrill peep of an alarm in the morning. Naruto Uzumaki was well acquainted with this fact, and was in no mood to hear that noise this morning.

_*Ring ring*_

The blonde boy dislodged his fist from the remains of what used to be an innocent alarm clock and blearily opened his eyes, searching for the true culprit of the noise. His gaze alighted upon a small vibrating object resting on his bedside table. Picking it up in the gloom of before dawn he found it to be a cell phone. Checking its screen he noticed the time to be 3:14 AM.

Wait a minute, since when did he own a cell phone?

Cautiously he pressed the 'call' button and put the phone to his ear in the same way that one might lift a tarantula out of its burrow.

"Hello?" he began.

Silence. Then:

"_**Hello Naruto, how are you?"**_

The Ninja in question jumped at the alien voice.

"Hey, Sai, if this is you playing another one of your stupid jokes then…"

"_**It's not Sai."**_

The voice was high and raspy, like someone who had just recovered from a severely sore throat and was still coughing up phlegm.

"Then who is it?"

"_**It doesn't matter."**_

"Look, pal, if you just called up to chat then I'm going back to bed. I'm tired and I want to get some sleep before I start training."

"_**I wouldn't hang up if I were you."**_

Naruto paused. "Why not?"

"_**There are currently several canisters of a deadly gas in the walls of your room known as potassium cyanide. They are connected to a remotely activated switch that is controlled by radio waves. When you pressed the call button, the switch was armed. If either of us hangs up, it will blow and you will be dead in approximately ten seconds. It's not a pleasant way to die. You more or less suffocate from the inside out. Now, of course, I don't like fancy traps like this, but I couldn't think of anything else that would work as well. Do you still not feel like talking?"**_

Naruto blanched. What was going on? This was insane!

"What is it you want?"

There was a sound like a sort of hacking laughter on the other end.

"_**Want? I don't want anything! However, you might be interested to know that currently there are similar traps in the houses of eleven friends of yours."**_

"Don't you dare hurt any of my friends!" Naruto snarled into the tiny receiver.

"_**Too late."**_

And with that, the line went dead. The ninja sat there in horrified silence, staring at the phone. It was at that moment that he heard the pneumatic hiss of gas being released.

Without even thinking he leapt through the window, smashing the glass completely and hurtling to the hard, unforgiving street below.

He managed to roll as he landed so as to avoid most of the impact, though that's not to say it didn't hurt.

Without pausing he leapt up to a rooftop and began racing through the night.

'Okay,' he thought, 'Time to think. Who's house is closest?'

Sai's was nearest to his own house; they both lived in the same crummy district of the city. Just as he was thinking this, he crashed into another figure heading in the opposite direction.

"Hey, watch it… wait, Kankurou?" Naruto stammered, looking up into the purple painted face. Kankurou, Gaara, and Temari were all visiting Konoha in order to view the Chuunin exams, which explained Naruto's seemingly random encounter.

"Naruto, did you get the phone call too?" asked the puppeteer, dropping a huge scroll onto the rooftop.

"Yeah, but we can't discuss it now. We have to get to the others' houses!"

Kankurou raised his hands in front of him. "Okay, calm down. Look, I have an idea."

Pulling out three more scrolls he spread them all out. Making a few hand-signs and laying his palms on each of the scrolls in turn, four wooden mannequins appeared.

"Crow, Black Ant, Salamander, and this guy." Kankurou ended anticlimactically, motioning toward a red-haired puppet, "I haven't come up with a name for him yet. I mean, his old name was Sasori, so I thought maybe scorpion but…"

"There's no time for explanations! Just do whatever you're thinking and I'll go get Sai and the rest of them!"

"Okay, just get in Black Ant."

"What?"

"Get in Black Ant."

"What?"

Kankurou sighed. "If I seal you inside of his stomach cavity then you'll be able to travel faster and straighter than you would on foot. When you get to someone's house just grab them from one of the holes in his sides here, okay?"

"Ok, let's go," Naruto climbed into the bloodstained interior of the wooden puppet, gagging at the stench of old flesh.

"K-Kankurou, how do you stand this?" he retched.

"Don't worry, it's not so bad once you get used to it."

Naruto then felt the mannequin leave the ground, soaring with a clacking and rattling sound through the air.


	2. Chapter 2

Death Trap: Chapter 2

Please R&R, tyvm :3

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"Sai!" Naruto tumbled disoriented from Kuroari's dreadful interior. Honestly, that ride had been about as comfourtable as being crammed into a two-litre bottle, strapped to the underside of a mule's hoof, and then galloping hard for three miles. All whilst being bathed in the overpowering odour of dead human flesh.

"Ah, Naruto, it's good to see that you're alright. I don't suppose you could lend me a hand?"

The tableau that Naruto beheld shocked him into a stunned silence. Sai was fully conscious and looking at him, but he was lashed to some sort of disturbing contraption which had taken the space previously occupied by the former ROOT member's bed.

"What the hell is that thing...?" Naruto breathed, mystified.

"I'm afraid I don't know. I woke up on it with a ringing phone taped to my hand. Unfortunately I made the mistake of answering it before freeing myself, as when I did the ropes suddenly tightened and I am now completely immobile."

Naruto studied the machine feverishly. "Was there anyone on the phone?" He asked, still desperately trying to form some mental image of this construct's purpose. It looked like a large segmented wooden slab supported on a central box. From either end of the box extended a taught rope which attached to Sai's arms and legs respectively.

"Yes, the person on the other end was speaking through a voice synthesizer though, so I could not identify it."

'That's what it was,' Naruto thought back to the high, rasping voice on the phone, 'No wonder it sounded so weird.'

"So what did it say?" The still pajama-clad ninja demanded. He had found a small door on one side of the box and was trying to pry it open.

"It said, and I quote: 'Don't try to get free, you'll only struggle yourself to death'," Sai replied matter-of-factly.

Naruto found a purchase on the door and wrenched it open, although he was only further bewildered by what he found inside. It was a mechanism of gears and cogs through which the ropes were threaded. Nonplussed at this sight, he grabbed firmly onto one of the ropes. It was so tightly drawn he could barely move it, but when he did the mechanism inside the box clanked and grated, and one segment of the slab on which Sai lay detached itself and clattered to the ground.

"What the..." Naruto tugged the rope again, and another segment on the opposite end of the of the slab fell off, it too heavily hitting the ground.

"Naruto?"

"Huh?"

"Can you tell me how many segments this table is made up of?"

Counting the pieces, Naruto replied: "Nine, including the two that fell off," Then suddenly he knew the device's purpose, and the knowledge hit him like a tonne of

bricks. The middle segment was much thinner than the others, and aligned perfectly with the small of his friend's back. One segment had fallen off of each end of the table, and the pattern would continue like that each time the rope was struggled against until only the middle one remained. The entire structure was balanced on top of the central box like a pivot, and Sai's arms and legs were being pulled toward the centre; already his hands and feet were over the edge of each end of the table, pulled painfully downward.

'It's going to snap his back,' Naruto thought, 'That bastard is going to snap his back, and each time Sai tries to get free he'll only get closer to death.'

Naruto grabbed Sai's knife from the bedside table, bringing the blade down sharply on the rope that bound his friend's legs. The tension in the rope exploded outward, and as one end flew into the central box the other end whipped up to catch Naruto across the face, leaving him bleeding.

"Ow!" Naruto clutched the gash in his forehead, tossing the knife into the air. Sai caught it with his bare feet, bringing it up above his head until he could grasp it with this hands and free himself completely. When he was done he went over to his saviour asking: "Are you alright?" When Naruto took his hands away from his wound with a hiss of pain, Sai saw that the cut was not deep, but the rope had hit him hard, and the area around the wound was already beginning to blacken and swell with bruises.

"Do you need medical aid?" Sai asked.

Naruto shook his head. "No time," he replied through clenched teeth, "We have to get to the others!" Then suddenly the phone rang.

Both ninjas slowly turned to look at the small device which lay on the floor. Naruto walked over to it, picking it up gingerly like one might a bomb. With his thumb he pressed the small, green 'receive' button, and raised it to his ear.

"Hello?" He said.

"I'm surprised your friend could stay so calm. I thought for sure he would struggle like a fish out of water and be dead in a minute."

"Then I guess you don't know him very well," Naruto replied to the nameless voice, "Sai is pretty good at not panicking."

"Well, I have things for that too," the voice countered with what almost sounded like amusement.

Naruto's temper began to rise. "You son of a bitch! You said that there were only gas traps in my friends' houses! What the hell was this supposed to be?"

"Did I say that?" The voice mocked, "I should have said that there were gas traps in only some houses, I cooked up special treats for some of your closer friends. Oh if only you could see them all now, they're perfectly delightful!" The insane relish in the voice sent a chill down the ninja's spine. "But don't worry too much," it continued, "I didn't put bars on any windows. Most people should escape the gas, so long as they don't dawdle. I still have plenty more games, so it wouldn't be any fun if they all died, would it?"

"You bastard!" Naruto shouted into the phone, "You little shit! I'll kill you! I'll kill you, you understand? I'll kill..." But the connection only closed amidst the voice's maniac laughter.

"Should we go and get the others?" Sai proposed after a moment.

"Yeah," Naruto replied, still seething with anger and fear. "Get into that puppet," he motioned towards Kuroari, "I'll ride on the back. I can't stand the smell of that thing.


	3. Chapter 3

Deathtrap: Chapter 3

Shoutouts:

Sassiwrites4u: That is such an awesome thought! I'm glad you like this :D

Hime-love-97: You'll find out... probably ;)

Bunnyboo1612: Thankyou, I'm hoping to start writing more frequently :)

Villain84 Beta 01: Thankyou very much, I really appreciate your interest!

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*_Ring ring*_

The irritating shrillness that can only belong to a mobile phone pierced Hinata's sleep like an icicle. She blearily opened one eye, then closed it again in that vain hope that if she ignored the offending device it would go away.

*_Ring ring*_

No such luck. With a sigh she threw back the covers restricting her arms and fumbled at the bedside table until she found the item which had so recently interrupted her rest. Any trace of sleep, however, driven from her body as she noticed that her left hand was chained to the bedpost. She flipped it open and squinted at the tiny luminescent screen, reading the characters "?" that were displayed thereon. Cautiously she put the device to her ear.

"Hello?"

"**Hello, Hinata," **came a scrambled voice from the other end of the line.

"Who is this?" she asked suspiciously.

"**Who is who?"** the faceless voice countered.

"You, who are you?"

"**Who cares?"**

"Why are you calling me?"

"**Just thought I'd tell you not to fall asleep tonight."**

Hinata paused. "What are you talking about?" she asked. Was this one of those obscene phone calls that Ino had told her about?

The voice ignored her question.

"**Hey... do you like puzzles?"**

"W-what? Um... sure..." she answered the odd question hesitantly.

"**Good, because this one's a killer. Look under you pillow."**

Hinata obeyed, searching under her pillow, left arm rattling the chains that bound it to the bedpost. She was just starting to feel panic blossom in her chest.

"There's nothing there," she spoke into the receiver. The chains on her wrist chafed her skin painfully

"**Look harder."**

Once again she felt under the pillow, searching every inch of the cool fabric. She felt something cold touch her thumb, and closed her fingers around its length. Pulling the object out from its refuge, she regarded it in the dim moonlight of her bedroom. It was very thin, about eight inches long, and it glinted unnervingly.

"A... knife?" she asked.

"**Now look at the foot of your bed."**

Hinata cast her eyes toward her bed's far end, and was startled and disturbed by what she saw there. There was a water tank such as one might find in an office building suspended from the ceiling, and below it there stood a kind of wide funnel emptying into a large glass container with lines etched onto its surface. The container was balanced on one end of what looked like a large pair of scales, and was held in the air by a heavy counterbalance. Underneath it on the ground there lay a dark metal plate attached to a wire which snaked under her bed.

"W-what is that?" Hinata whispered, frightened by the menacing sight.

"**Let me break this down for you: that water is going to fall into the glass tank, gradually increasing its weight. There is a wire connected to a car battery attached to the scales on which the tank rests, so the whole thing is electrified. As the tank increases in weight, it will eventually outweigh the counterbalance and fall to the metal plate on the ground. Each line on the tank represents five minutes, so you've got about half an hour until the circuit is complete. Plus, don't try screaming for help. There's a tripwire across that door that'll complete the circuit anyway if it's disturbed even a fraction of an inch."**

"The c-circuit? What do you mean? What is it p-powering?"

"**A bomb."**

"What?" Hinata cried.

The voice on the other end burst into laughter, and then the line went dead. A tiny spark of flame spat at the nozzle of the container on the ceiling, and there was the unmistakeable sound of rushing water. Hinata could hear it splashing into the jar at the bottom, further fueling her rising sense of dread.

Her ninja training took over. Mind working feverishly, she quickly took stock of the situation. She was chained to her bed-frame, so movement was pretty much impossible. The chains were made of industrial grade steel, so she could hardly break them, and her bed was constructed of tough wood. While Hinata may have been a ninja, brute force was not her forte, so breaking her bed-frame was pretty much out of the question as well. Reluctantly, she considered the possibility of breaking her own wrist to slide out of the chains, but a quick tug at her bonds showed that she was shackled too tightly for any such plan to be effective, and the knife was far too flimsy to consider amputation.

'Think!' she told herself, 'Use your brain!'

Since there was no way to escape the chains, and even if she somehow could the bomb would only kill her family anyways, she had to figure out a way to disarm the device from her current position. Still, what did she have to work with? Just a flimsy knife. She bit her lip nervously, breathing hard and once more pulled at the chains that bound her. Pain shot through her arm as she did, and she noticed that the chains had chafed the skin from her wrist. Beads of blood, black in the darkness, rolled down onto the stark white surface of her pillow, wetly staining it like ink on paper.

Could she perhaps throw the knife? Break the nozzle of the water tank? No, that would only make the water flow faster, cutting short the precious minutes she had been given. But why had the voice given her those minutes in the first place? Why wake her up in the middle of the night to inform her of her imminent demise? Was it just to gloat? She supposed if was possible, but if that had been the case, then why make sure she found the knife?

'Perhaps so I can kill myself before the bomb detonates,' she speculated. So, was this to be her fate? The eldest daughter of the great Hyuuga household, either suicidally bleeding to death or blown to smithereens along with her entire clan. Hinata pondered the idea, drawing up her free hand to rub her injured wrist. The blood congealed on her fingers, making them sticky, until it dried and flaked off like tiny falling leaves. Her gaze wandered towards the bloodstain left on the pillow, and, almost as if guided by providence, she ran her fingers over the dark spot. It was tough, crusty, having become rigid with the saturation of blood into fabric. Suddenly the answer hit her with the force of a tidal wave.

She was meant to escape this trap! The voice had sounded too full of relish at her helplessness to give her any sort of escape from it, let alone anything as merciful as a blade with which to kill herself. No, she was meant to use it for something else.

Feverishly, Hinata reached downward and tore the light cotton sheet that had previously covered her from the foot of the bed. Bringing it up to headboard, she awkwardly folded it into a long, thin rectangle. From there, she pulled up the hem of her nighty, until her thigh rested on the folded sheet. Taking a deep breath, she took the blade and sank its tip into her pale flesh, drawing it in a long line upwards. The blade bit like ice and stung like fire, but she merely clenched her teeth and continued. The blood came in gouts from her leg, spilling over the snowy covers of her bed before being gluttonously lapped up by the absorbent cotton. When she was satisfied that she had covered the entire sheet, she took a pillowcase and twisted it tightly around her leg, tightly enough to slow the bleeding to a sluggish ooze.

Blowing frantically on the blood-soaked sheet to dry it faster, she watched as the water splashed into the tank, and saw the scales gradually tip more and more towards her doom. At last the blood had congealed to a point where the sheet had become reasonably rigid, cemented into its rectangular shape. Straining with all the strength in her body, Hinata took the sheet by its end, pointing the other end towards the spring of water that poured from the ceiling. She fought the chain for every inch, as her blood-soaked shroud neared ever closed to the stream of water.

"Just a bit more," she said through gritted teeth, "Just a bit!"

Then the toughened sheet caught the stream of water in its downfall, angling it so that it rushed down the length of the sheet and cascaded harmlessly over Hinata's hand. She laughed out loud, elated with her success. She drew in a deep breath and smiled at the sensation of the cool water on her fingers. She had outwitted her captor, and saved her own life.

Then again, had she really outwitted the voice? Had she truly escaped certain death or merely played right into his hands? As the last dregs of water trickled down the length of the now sopping wet blood-sheet, Hinata drew it back and dropped it on her bed. She fell back and rested her head on the pillows, adrenaline still coursing through her veins. Suddenly she remembered the deep self-inflicted gash in her leg, as excitement had made her numb. Looking towards her wound, she saw that her poor substitute for a tourniquet had already soaked through and was dripping crimson. She felt dizzy and a bit sick looking at the copious mess of her own blood. It was obvious that she would need some professional medical attention soon.

She was just about to twist another pillowcase around her injured leg when there came a frantic rapping at her window. Looking up, startled, she was surprised to see the grotesque visage of what appeared to be a crude wooden facsimile of the devil, complete with goat's horns and jet-black hair. Over the construct's shoulder, however, she was relieved to see Naruto's concerned face.

"Naruto!" she gasped. The boy in question was looking horrified at the scene he beheld through the glass pane. He banged his fist on the window and shouted incomprehensibly, desperate to gain entry but wary of any traps he might spring. Hinata gestured for him to enter, motioning towards her bound arm to explain why she did not open the window herself. Taking the ring-pommel of a kunai, Naruto brought it down on the glass, shattering it instantly.

"Hinata! Holy shit, what did he do to you?" Naruto demanded as he leapt through the window and began tugging at her chains.

"H-he... I..." Hinata didn't really know where to begin. She was nervous enough around Naruto already; couple that with narrowly escaping a grisly death mere moments beforehand and significant blood loss and one can hardly blame Hinata for promptly losing consciousness.

"Agh! Hinata! Speak to me!" Naruto held Hinata's face by her chin, checking for a pulse at the base of her neck.

An very disheveled Sai fumbled his way out of Kuroari's black interior, and rushed over to Hinata's bedside. "Naruto! Please, stand aside," he ordered, drawing his knife.

Uncertainly the blonde ninja took a step back. With a short breath, Sai brought down his knife on the bedpost, severing it cleanly and allowing the chains to fall in a pile to the ground.

"Oh no, Hinata, please!" Naruto was on the verge of panicking, "Say something!"

"It looks like she's severed her descending lateral circumflex artery," Sai observed, tearing a strip off one of her bedsheets and wrapping it tightly around her thigh, "She's lost a lot of blood. It doesn't look good."

"You shut up!" Naruto shouted at the pale ninja, rage and fear distorting his features, "You don't know Hinata! She's strong, she'll get through this!" He seemed to be saying the words more for his own reassurance than for Sai's.

Naruto grasped Hinata's slim shoulders and picked her up bridal-style. He clenched his teeth, taking deep breaths in a vain attempt to calm himself. 'Please don't die, Hinata,' he thought desperately, 'Please, if you died here it would be all my fault.'

Hinata had almost died for him once, he wouldn't let it happen again. He couldn't.

"Let's go!" he commanded, leaping out of the shattered window


End file.
